Most disappointing Game of Thrones Episode: Night King’s Grand Battle

Minor spoilers. Last night HBO airs the third episode of Game of Thrones to an insane hoard of people who waited 585 days for this season, me included. Most Avid fans knew tonight’s episode would conclude the Night King’s story as the real battle has always been with Cersei. The season started off understandably slow and started to disappoint from the start. The first Episode was barely 50 minutes long and each one slightly longer thereafter. Last night’s episode, 3rd in the season was 80’s movie length.

Ever since Game of Thrones went beyond R.R. Martin’s source material the show has gone to hell as it stands. It went from dark, gritty, historically inspired Medieval fairy tale to a “Made for TV Lifetime” series based on over compensated woman empowerment and pushing men to the wayside. While I’m all for strong woman leaders, they have gone completely overboard with the concept just as “Into the Badlands” by AMC has done. Note: See unapologetic explanation of what I mean at the bottom.

It started off like an Old DC Movie

For the first half of this show, it was similar to a DC movie. Everything was pitch black and you couldn’t see any action. Just lots of metal clang and screams of pain. John and Daenerys were mostly clumsy and useless. Flying blind in the Nigh King’s winter storm. They took the valuable dragons off the front line to fly around in darkness. They left their posts and failed to do their one job of lighting the trenches on fire and pick off the hoards of undead to give their front lines some relief.

The Dothraki army, well who the heck gave that order or were they just eager to charge off into the darkness to wage battle with an enemy not even seen yet? I get the cinematic aspect of this. they wanted to raise suspense of the scene by showing the light being consumed by darkness, a massive army blotting out the land. But they screwed up. Honestly I’m a bit town on this one. the Dothraki are battle hungry savages, at the same time, they’re not stupid. They’re akin to Vikings of the old, riding off into battle and glory. They rely on swift strikes and surprise. Not blind charges into death itself.

Let’s Start with Daenerys

Daenerys Targaryen got the biggest humbling of all characters in this episode. Her entire kingdom was built on fear of her dragons and the 40,000 strong slave army she promised were now free, yet still orders. Her entire role was looking pretty and giving orders from a throne. She never picked up a sword, tasted battle except for her one trick of setting everything on fire and surviving.

Finally overwhelmed, losing both her remaining dragons to the hoard of undead it’s just her and the only man she truly loved, Jorah left alone to fight an endless battle. A woman who never picked up a sword is now empowered to start killing wraiths while all the time hiding behind Jorah who also loves her and willing to die for her. but as is still true in the real world, the men die before the woman.

Excessive Stare-downs

Bran’s one skill is getting squinty eyed and having epic staring contests with people. This series of scenes was WAY overdone and really could have been chopped in half. Was it really that necessary to have the Night King spend 10 minutes of the show walking in slow motion towards Bran while Theon, spent from defending him stands waiting? Night King had his long cold icy staring thing with John Snow as he raised the recently dead to refill the ranks. Then he walks off to leave his minions to finish off John. Of course John blasts on through and gets pinned down by a really angry undead dragon.

Arya’s Grand Moment

Arya is possibly the best developed character in the TV series. She was always headstrong but lacked the skill to back it. So she sought after the skills to succeed in her life mission to rejoin and protect her family. Arya got the crap end of a lot of injustice and pulled through stronger at each moment. She never complained about life or how much she suffered. If she ever did it was followed by “he’s on my list”.

Arya deserves two paragraphs but she’s not without criticism. Her scenes were too long and fluffed. The whole library scene and everyone else sneaking through the castle was overplayed. It was too long and ripped us from the adrenaline rush of the main battle. It was a quiet, yet poorly implemented suspense builder.

Then Arya stole the one thing the John should have gotten. We all waited for John’s grand moment ever since he fled the island and learn how to kill the wraiths. Or Theon, his dying moment, his last redemption should have gotten this moment. But Arya, thanks to HBO embarrassingly over doing it with woman empowerment, got it.

Embarassing Dialog

They really did diminish Sansa’s role in the series. She’s the most scarred of the Stark family, difficult to move on from her problems though getting the least bad things happen. She’s sent to the Crypts (had potential to be the best scene) and given a dagger. When she exclaims “I don’t know how to use this”, the reply is the old and worn out trope “pointy end this way”. There’s a slew of better lines and the whole conversation was stupid.

Even the great conversationalist himself Tyrion Lannister, was dumped into pathetic quips and stupid lines. He was a great character, reduced to dialog given by a Millenial intern screen writer. The season has that “written by SJW’s barely past puberty” feel to it.

But wait, there’s more

Not really actually. I was trying to keep this short and it exploded on me. Thanks for reading. till I rip apart next week’s show. OR maybe not. I really don’t like writing about pop culture because I do have more important things to do.

Side Note

I’m all for strong female characters. But not at the expense where all the men are turn into little beta bitches. It’s being completely done wrong, not just in Game of Thrones but in many other great shows like “Into the Badlands” and “Now Apocalypse”. What’s really being ignored is how both Genders can be strong. How they complete each other, not compete with each other. How there will be conflict between both genders and how they can work through the adversity to come to an understanding.